Material Science and Engineering, 45 (1980) 183 - 188
Elsevier Sequoia S.A., Lausanne -- Printed in the Netherlands
Relationship between the Shear Lip Size and the Fracture
M. O. LAI* and W. G. FERGUSON
School of Engineering, University of Auckland (New Zealand)
(Received July 6, 1979; in revised form February 12, 1980)
SUMMARY
The shear lip size BSL obtained from
compact tension specimens of thicknesses
varying from 4 to 25 mm (the steel specimens
were machined from Comsteel En25
tempered from the as-quenched state to
600 C and the aluminium specimens were
cast 7075-T6 aluminium alloy) was found to
be related to the plane strain fracture tough-
ness Krc through the expression
BSL = 0.41(Ka--~)z
where oys is the 0.2% proof stress o f the
material. A rationale for this behaviour is that
BSL is approximately equal to the size ry of
the plane stress plastic zone at the surface of a
plate specimen, which from theoretical
analysis has been shown to be
ry 8 \ Oys
The fracture toughness versus shear lip size
relationship is believed to have considerable
importance in the analysis of service failures
of plate specimens.
1. INTRODUCTION
When a plate with a through-thickness
crack is subjected to a tensile load, the stress
intensity at the crack tip is so high that a plas-
tically deformed region called the plastic zone
is formed. The size ry of the plastic zone is
estimated to be
*Present address: University of Singapore,
Singapore.
183
Toughness
where Kc is the critical stress intensity factor,
oys is the 0.2% p r o o f stress of the material
and A is a constant of value 1/2u in plane stress
conditions and 1/6~ in plane strain conditions
[ 1]. Recent investigations by Rice [ 2, 3 ] have
shown that under plane stress conditions A
takes a value of ~/8. Tomkin [4] analytically
obtained an approximately equal value of
0.39. A simplified three-dimensional represen-
tation of the crack tip plastic zone is shown in
Fig. 1.
SURFACE
~CTION OF ~
4"" ]
Fig. 1. Representation of the crack tip plastic zone.
The existence of a plane stress plastic zone
at the surfaces and a plane strain plastic zone
in the middle of a specimen is reflected in the
fracture surface topography in that in the
middle the fracture is flat and at the surfaces
the fracture is 45 slant and shear. Indeed the
formation of the shear lips as a result of a
plane stress fracture mode indicates that the
size BSL of the shear lip is a measure of the
size of the plane stress plastic zone at the free
surfaces. Hence eqn. (1) may be rewritten as
BSL 8 \ay s /
taking A = n/8 from the results of Rice [2,
3].
The relationship between the shear lip size
and the fracture toughness depicted in eqn.
(2) was first postulated by Kraft et al. [5, 6]
184
who considered that the shear lip was the
elastic-plastic boundary of the plastic zone.
The relationship has been verified by Holt et
al. [7]. In the investigation described in this
paper we attempted to obtain further data to
confirm such a relationship which is believed
to be of importance in service failure analysis.
Instead of estimating the fracture toughness
of a failed c o m p o n e n t using the cumbersome
conventional standard testing method, it
can be obtained by measuring the shear lip
size and the yield stress and by employing
eqn. (2).
2. EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE
The materials used were Comsteel En25 (a
commercial high strength low alloy steel
supplied in the form of a black bar 125 mm in
diameter) and cast 7075-T6 aluminium alloy
(supplied as blocks 160 mm thick). The
nominal composition for the steel specimen
was 0.31% C, 0.26% Si, 0.58% Mn, 2.22% Ni,
0.59% Cr, 0.53% Mo, 0.025% P and 0.032% S
and that of the aluminium specimen was
1.46% Cu, 2.51% Mg and 5.76% Zn.
The c o m p a c t tension specimens were made
with dimensions in accordance with ref. 8 and
the Comsteel En25 specimens had an R-L or
C-L crack plane orientation. In order to study
the effect of specimen thickness on shear lip
size, a range of thicknesses from 4 to 25 mm
with a 3 mm incremental interval was used.
All the steel specimens were austenitized at
850 C for 1 h in a salt bath and were then
quenched into a flowing column of oil. Apart
from the as-quenched specimens, all other
specimens were tempered for 1 h at one of
the following temperatures: 100, 200, 300,
400, 450, 500, 550 and 600 C. In many
cases, three sets of specimens of thicknesses
from 4 to 25 mm were tested at each temper-
ing temperature.
Specimens were fatigue precracked and
fracture tested with an MTS electrohydraulic
machine using the procedure set o u t in ref. 8.
After testing, the fractured surfaces were
photographed so that the crack length and the
shear lip thickness could be measured on a
magnified scale. Measurements of shear lip
size (Fig. 2) were made on both slant surfaces
of a fractured half of a specimen and at three
locations: one-quarter, one-half and three-
~ SHEAR LIP SIZE
FL FRACTURE
~ SURFACE DEPRESSION
Fig. 2. Cross section of the shear lip.
quarters of the distance from the tip of the
fatigue crack to the unnotched edge of the
specimen. The average of the six measure-
ments was recorded.
Fracture toughness tests at testing temper-
atures below ambient were carried o u t on the
7075-T6 aluminium alloy specimens using an
Instron testing machine. The test temper-
atures used were 0, - - 7 8 and --196 C and
were obtained with an i c e - w a t e r mixture, a
dry i c e - a c e t o n e mixture and liquid nitrogen
respectively. The specimens were submerged
in the testing medium for at least 1 h before
they were fractured.
The 0.2% proof stress of the material was
determined from tensile specimens machined
from the fractured half of the compact ten-
sion specimen. The axis of the tensile
specimen was perpendicular to the crack
plane in the compact tension specimen. At
least t w o tensile specimens were tested at
each tempering temperature.
3. RESULTS
Shear lip size measurements from the
present study showed that BSL was constant
along the crack length of the specimens. For a
given tempering temperature the size of the
shear lip was found to be independent of the
thickness of the test specimen, as shown in
Fig. 3. This thickness independence of the
shear lip size is in agreement with the findings
of other investigators [9, 10].
Figure 4 shows a linear plot o f the shear lip
size against the relative toughness Kc/ay~ at
constant specimen thickness over the entire
range of tempering temperatures investigated.
It can be seen that for a particular thickness
the B versus Kc/oys relationship initially
follows a similar trend to the theoretical
 185

~ r : i [
o o
only on whether there is plane strain or plane
E
E ~.0
_o
o o
stress. The conclusion that Kic instead of Kc
d should be used in eqn. (2) is substantiated by
the work of Krafft and Sullivan [6] in that
the estimation of the plastic zone size based
on Kic appears to match the experimental
"7 shear lip size better than that based on Kc.
/
Equation (2) may be rewritten as

BSL 8 \Oys / (3)

All the data in Fig. 4 that satisfied the stan-

SPECIMEN THICKNESS, mm
dard [ 8] for valid Km are replotted in Fig. 5
Fig. 3. Plots of the shear lip size BSL against the spec- on log-log scales. It can be seen that the data
imen thickness for various tempering temperatures
(to separate the graphs, BSL is incremented by an
follow approximately a linear relationship at
amount D): , as-quenched; lb, 100 C, D = 0.5; A, tempering temperatures below about 450 C
200C,D=1.0;o 300C,D= 1.5;n 400C,D= whereas at high tempering temperatures the
2.0;~, 450C, D = 2.5; , 500 C,D = 3.0; ~, 550 C, deviation from linearity is evident. The linear
D = 3.5; o, 600 C, D = 4.0. relationship was found to be
/ r i r 0 4 1 ( K I c ) ~'
SPECIMEN THICKNESS m m BSL= . \-~ys/ (4)
E 2
E which compares favourably with eqn. (3).
/ This agreement indicates that the size of the
rn I-5
shear lip is not only a representation of the
/' plane stress plastic zone at the free surfaces
J but also a measure of its size. The size of the
n- shear lip is governed by the plane strain frac-
w
1" ture toughness.
For tempering temperatures higher than
450 C, Fig. 5 shows that the experimental
2 3 4 5 5
RELATIVE TOUGHNESS Kc/OYS ,/'~'~ results do n o t conform to eqn. (4) but deviate
Fig. 4. Plots of the shear lip size against the relative
from it with increasing tempering temper-
plane stress fracture toughness: . . . . , Rice's [ 2, 3 ]
data; - - - - - , Irwin's [ 1 ] d a t a ; - - , our data.

2.O
plastic zone size estimations of Irwin [1] and

~
%c= o.4 ys)
Rice [2, 3]. At large specimen thicknesses the
experimental curves tend towards Rice's soo
/'//
result whereas at small thicknesses they tend
E o/ esso
towards Irwin's results. From the experimen- w
/i ~oo
N
tal observation, however, shear lip size is inde-
~4GO
pendent of specimen thickness, and for a ./
_J
given tempering temperature the yield stress
o / 2~o
of the material is invariant. Thus, if the shear "r t e~perlng t em~er~l~ ~,*C

lip size is to be related to the relative tough-

ness, it is necessary that the value of the frac- 1~o

ture toughness remain constant with specimen

thickness. The fracture toughness parameter
/
used in eqn. (2) should therefore be the i J I i
material constant Km rather than Kc which is , ~ , ,4 ,

specimen thickness dependent. Examination RELATIVE TOUGHNESS,

of eqn. (2) shows accordingly that A is a Fig. 5. Plots of the shear lip size against the relative
constant; this is consistent since A depends plane strain fracture toughness Kic/Oy s.
186
ature. The shear lips in this temperature range
were found to be less well formed and
defined. The surface depression (see Fig. 2) in
the plane of fracture increased rather abruptly
when the tempering temperature was greater
than 450 C, as s h o w n i n Fig. 6. We have prev-
iously [11] shown that the Kxc values used in
Fig. 5 for the specimens tempered above
450 C were n o t the true Kxc values even
though the standard requirements [8] were
satisfied. For these specimens the ratio of the
net section stress to the yield stress, which
according to Kaufman and Nelson [12]
should be kept below two-thirds even in the
general plane strain region, was well in excess
of 0.67. The criterion suggested by Andersson
[13] that Pmax/BWoys must be less than
0.030 for plane strain conditions to prevail in
a specimen was found n o t to hold for the
present specimens tempered above 450 C be-
cause Pmax/BWoys was greater than 0.030.
The KIc values determined with insufficient
specimen thickness will be overestimated and
therefore they push the data points towards
the right, away from the linear relationship, as
seen in Fig. 5.
I [ I I I I i eratures provided that valid Kxc values are
0,3
IE
Z
o_
O3
o~
e~
0.1
[ I I I I ~ I
o lOO 400
TEMPERING TEMPERATURE,c
Fig. 6. Plots of the surface depression against the
tempering temperature for various specimen thick-
nesses.
To examine whether eqn. (4) is applicable
at tempering temperatures above 450 C, valid
Kxc values have to be determined. These were
obtained from the stretch zone width. It has
been suggested [14] that the stretch zone
width from a fractured specimen can be used
for estimating the value of the crack-opening
displacement 5i at crack initiation. 5i is a
material constant related to the plane strain
Kic value [15] through the equation
gic 2
6i -
E~oys
where E is Young's modulus of the material,
ay, is the yield stress and X is a constant. The
value of ), determined experimentally has
been found to be unity [16 - 19]. Recent
investigations have shown that the stretch
zone width is equal to half of the value of 8 i
[ 2 0 ] . This is very similar to the findings of
Harris and Elliott [21] and the simple model
of Green et aL [ 1 4 ] .
In the present study, the stretch zone
width was measured with a scanning electron
microscope. It was found that the stretch
zones in specimens tempered below 300 C
were usually very small and ill defined. The
values of Km calculated using the stretch
zone width are plotted in the form of relative
toughness as a function of shear lip size on
log-log scales in Fig. 7. The data show that
eqn. (4) is valid even at high tempering temp-
used.
i i i I ]
5.C
o o
o
0.
i.c
:-.
tY
L- r~
C~
0-5
LiI I I J
I Z ~ 4
REL~'IVE TOUGH~SS, m~-~
Fig. 7. Plot of t h e s h e a r lip size against the relative
plane strain fracture toughness for true KIC data
(unless stated otherwise, all data are for En25): e,
t r u e KIc from standard [8] ; o, from stretch zone
width; m, 7075-T6 aluminium alloy, below ambient;
~, 7075-T6 aluminium alloy, room t e m p e r a t u r e ;
~, from the J integral.

To confirm the finding, the true K~c value
at a tempering temperature of 600 C was
independently determined using a J integral
approach similar to that suggested by Landes
and Begley [ 22]. The value of Jm was found
[23] to be 28.5 N mm -1 (Fig. 8), giving a
K~c value of 80.1 MPa m 1/2, which compares
favourably with the 78.5 MPa m 1/2 evaluated
from the stretch zone width approach. It can
be concluded that eqn. (4) is applicable to the
entire range of tempering temperatures tested.
Data from the 7075-T6 aluminium spec-
imens tested at temperatures of ambient and
below were found to fit the predicted behav-
iour (see Fig. 7), showing that the relationship
between fracture toughness and shear lip size
holds for other materials.
6O
j = 2,*,adFLOW
I " ~
dlC = 28..5 NMM/k4M
2O
I "
FIBROus CRACK LENGTH ~~,MM
Fig. 8. Plot of the J integral against the fibrous crack
length.
4. APPLICATION
For the determination of the plane strain
fracture toughness the standard [ 8] imposes
severe restrictions on the conditions of testing
to ensure that the a m o u n t of plasticity
occurring in the test is negligible in compar-
ison with the dimensions of the s p e c i m e n
used, As a result, the test m e t h o d is difficult
to use, time consuming and expensive for
general application. Many of the drawbacks
can be overcome simply by measuring the size
of the shear lips at the free surfaces of a spec-
imen and its yield strength. The results of the
present study demonstrate that K]c/Oys can
be related to the shear lip size through eqn.
(4). Hence it is evident that the shear lip size
can be used to provide a quick y e t accurate
value of Km for plate specimens.
In order to extend the applicability of the
shear lip size versus fracture toughness rela-
187
tionship, data from other investigations [24 -
27] using c o m p a c t tension specimens of dif-
ferent materials are shown for comparison in
Fig. 9. Only data known to comply with the
standard [8] for valid Kic were included.
Some scatter in the data is evident but it can
be seen that the relationship expressed in eqn.
(4) is obeyed reasonably well.
: ~ i r ! I
i
o sI
/
o
z
o ~o
co
LLI
N
a_ 0.t
~.05
/
.I"
/..
0.1
I I I I i lill
0.5 I
RELATIVE TOUGHNESS,
Fig. 9. Plot of the shear lip size against the relative
plane strain fracture toughness for data from several
materials: El, ref. 26;A, ref. 27; o, ref. 24; , ref. 25;
this study.
The shear lip sizes measured from the
tensile specimens of the present study and
from standard Charpy V-notched specimens
and fatigue-cracked Charpy specimens [28]
made of Comsteel En25 were found to give
considerable scatter although the data points
fell in the vicinity of eqn. (4) (Fig. 10). The
discrepancies for the Charpy tests may
perhaps be attributed to the differences in
loading rates (which affect the determination
of the fracture toughness) and to suppression
of the shear lip formation in impact tests
[ 2 9 ] . For tensile tests the stress state and the
state of the material will be complex and
generally unknown. Thus any correlation is
probably fortuitous.
5. CONCLUSION
(1) The size of the shear lips on the free
surfaces of c o m p a c t tension specimens was
constant along the path of crack propagation
and was independent of the specimen thick-
ness.
 188
r ~ i I I '
z
~0~
N Book o f A S T M Standards, Part 10, American
Q_
J
r~
G'3
0.01
RELATIVE TOUGHNESS,,6"~
Fig. 10. Plot of the shear lip size against the relative
plane strain fracture toughness for tensile (o) and
impact data (o).
(2) The size of the shear lips was found to
be related to the plane strain fracture tough-
ness Kic rather than to Kc.
(3) The relationship between the plane
strain fracture toughness and the size of the
shear lip over the entire range of testing
conditions and tempering temperatures inves-
tigated was shown to be given by
0 41(Kin/2"
BSL = . \~/
(4) The relationship between Kic and BSL
was nearly identical with the theoretical
prediction of Rice [2, 3] on the size of the
plane stress plastic zone and hence suggests
that the shear lip is not only a representation
of the plastic zone but also a measure of its
size.
(5) The data of other investigators for
compact tension specimens were also found
to follow the same fracture toughness v e r s u s
shear lip size relationship. Further investiga-
tion is required, however, to examine whether
or not the relationship is applicable to spec-
imen geometries other than plate specimens.
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